


Once Upon Our Story

by andthelightbulbclicks



Series: The 100 Chopped Challenge [7]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bookstore, Alternate Universe - Library, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Break-up/Make-up, Did They or Didn't They, Extremely biased flashbacks of the same event, F/M, Sort Of, chopped holiday trope exchange
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:53:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28344198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andthelightbulbclicks/pseuds/andthelightbulbclicks
Summary: Bellamy returns with as much fanfare as one can imagine when driving a school bus decorated as Santa Claus through town, leaving Clarke shocked and all of their friends confused given he hasn't been home in months.(Or: Six months ago, Bellamy left Arkadia.Six months ago, Clarke didn't.Six months ago, their friends knew the relationship ended, even came up with their own versions of what really happened. But the question that they all want to know for certain-- is why?)
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin
Series: The 100 Chopped Challenge [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1706239
Comments: 4
Kudos: 39
Collections: Chopped: Holiday Trope Exchange





	Once Upon Our Story

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bellamythology](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellamythology/gifts).



> Happy Holidays to all! But especially to my mystery Chopped Holiday Trope Exchange recipient!! 🎁
> 
> I thoroughly enjoyed creating this story with the tropes you chose, and I hope you enjoy reading it just as much!!!
> 
> For those curious about the tropes...  
>  **Theme** : Holiday AU (+Modern AU)  
>  **Trope #1** : Break-Up/Make-Up  
>  **Trope #2** : Did They or Didn't They  
>  **Trope #3** : Extremely biased flashbacks of the same event  
>  **Trope #4** : Bookstore AU or Library AU (I mainly stuck with the the bookstore part, but well, you'll see what I mean...)
> 
> There are most certainly some other tropes sprinkled throughout like holiday confetti as well, lol!

Clarke Griffin loves her bookstore.

Her father opened The Ark after he had retired from his engineering job, and when he passed right after her high school graduation, Clarke had inherited it with the full intent of running the store instead of going to college, much to her mother’s dismay.

But it’s what Clarke wanted.

She wanted to keep the little bookshop running in their town of Arkadia. After all, her father had entrusted it to her. Well, her and Bellamy, that is. But Clarke doesn’t much like to think about how they had done just that, together, for the past four years until everything changed six months ago.

So yes, Clarke loves her little bookstore in her little town with her little family made up of the best friends in the world who help and support her in any way they can.

What she does not love though, is when they come barging into her store first thing in the morning yelling nonsense while poor Harper is trying to do her morning reading circle in the back corner of the shop with the toddlers and their mothers.

“I had _nothing_ to do with this Clarke!” Jasper yells as he barrels through the door, arms already flailing out in front of him before he even knows where she is. Monty files in much more quietly behind his best friend, eyeing the whole scene warily and sending her an apologetic look from where Jasper can’t see. 

“But I’m a good friend!” Jasper bellows on, ignoring the glares of the mommies in the corner and heading towards the cash register Clarke is standing behind when he finally spots her. He slams his hands onto the counter dramatically, all while keeping crazed eye contact with her, and Clarke is seriously starting to debate whether or not he’s high at 9AM.

“And you should at least have a few seconds warning before—”

He’s cut off by one of the mothers in the back shushing him loudly, which seems to break him out of his crazed rant as he finally glances into the back of the store through the bookshelves to see a half dozen angry mothers glaring back at him. Madi’s even popped her head out in curiosity from the back storage room where she’s unloading the newest shipment. 

It’s Monty, of course, that whisper-shouts a hasty apology that Harper takes as her cue to carry on with the story as Jasper turns his attention back to Clarke. 

“Jasper,” she says on a laugh, more amused than anything by the theatrics, “what in the world are you talking about?” If it was anyone else coming in screaming a crazed warning on an early Saturday morning, she might be genuinely worried, but with Jasper, it’s anyone’s guess on what the problem could be.

Jasper heaves a dramatic sigh, out of breath as if he ran from somewhere in town to give her this mysterious warning. And just when he’s opening his mouth to give her what she assumes will be some clarity, a sound she never expected she’d hear this year sounds from the street right outside the shop.

It’s a car horn, or well, a bus horn. And it’s honking to the tune of the chorus ‘Jingle Bells.’

It’s a sound she’s more than familiar with, after all, she was there when Raven helped Bellamy wire it four years ago. But what she can’t figure out is why the hell she can hear the Santa Bus right outside her shop.

Jasper, still catching his breath, just points with his thumb to the shop entrance where the sound is permeating from. “ _That_ is what I’m talking about,” he says with finality.

But Clarke hardly hears him as she rounds the counter and storms out of the store onto the Main Street of Arkadia to find none other than the Santa Bus rolling to a stop right in front of her.

It’s decorated the same as it was when Bellamy and her put it together four years ago. After they took over the bookstore, they wanted to try some new events and ideas to show the town this young couple meant business about running their store— and with a bus heading to the junkyard in December of their first year as owners, the Santa Bus was born.

It was a way for the townspeople, young and old, to get together with holiday stories old and new while riding along through the town of Arkadia. More of a library than a bookstore, but everyone loved it.

Clarke and their friends spent every free moment those first two weeks of December decorating the outside of the bus with a massive Santa Claus face and lights strung everywhere as Bellamy, Raven, Miller, and Monty worked to get the bus functional again.

And then the week of Christmas, Bellamy blared the ‘Jingle Bells’ horn hundreds of times as friends and family hopped onto the bus and read The Ark’s holiday collection with one another or quietly on their own. They couldn’t bring themselves to charge for the rides, and any donations made went straight to Arkadia’s public library since the Santa Bus unwittingly became a mobile library one week per year, a new tradition, a new fixture, for four years.

But Clarke also knows that the Santa Bus wasn’t happening this year.

She stands on the sidewalk with her arms crossed, feeling extremely unimpressed as the swinging doors of the bus open, only to find the last person she’d possibly expect to see in Arkadia smiling sheepishly back at her.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Clarke asks Bellamy bluntly, keeping eye contact from where he sits in the driver’s seat even as Murphy and Miller hop down the stairs and off the bus, momentarily obstructing her view of him. She knows what she’s seeing, only ever saw him driving the bus, but she’s having a hard time grasping that he’s actually here.

It looks like he hesitates, taking in her stance, before steeling himself from the argument he undoubtedly knows is coming by setting his signature smirk in place. Clarke resolutely ignores the swoop her stomach gives at the sight.

“It’s the week before Christmas.”

It’s the obvious, she knows, but he’s well aware that’s not what she's asking.

“And?” Clarke prompts, refusing to give him an inch.

Bellamy shakes his head knowingly as if he knew that was coming. Clarke watches him shift the gears on the bus and turn the key, the hum of the bus going silent as he stands and makes his way down the stairs as well, standing on the last step with his hands gripping either side of the door and leaning out of the bus casually towards her with that smirk. “And the Santa Bus runs every year during the week before Christmas,” he states matter-of-factly, if not with a bit of challenge in his voice.

Clarke holds firm in her stance, refusing to let the close proximity affect her. She _can’t_ let it affect her.

“Not this year,” she tells him, feeling the eyes of their friends behind her as she says the words. They all know that.

She told them that she spoke with Wells in length about it. As mayor, he had been saddened by the news. The Santa Bus really has become a town hit.

But as her best friend, he understood why it would be too much, too hard, for Clarke.

Their friends had agreed reluctantly, knowing Clarke wouldn’t, _couldn’t,_ do the event without _him._

And yet, here he is, Santa Bus in tow right on time. But this year is different. This year, Bellamy’s been gone. And nobody expected him to be back. 

“Clarke,” he says, pulling her from thoughts to where he is still leaning over her. “We can’t _not_ do this. It’s tradition. Everyone is looking forward to it.”

How would he know? He hasn’t been here. “Everyone here knows that we aren’t doing it this year,” she tells him again, because apparently the first time wasn’t enough.

But still, he pushes on. “Then imagine how excited they’ll be when they realize that it actually is,” he tells her, pure challenge in his eyes now, even has his curls fall in front of them. She refuses to let herself notice though.

Instead, she turns around without a word and marches through the crowd Murphy, Miller, Jasper, and Monty have formed and back into the shop, sure that all five of them will follow her in.

* * *

“Is that the Santa Bus?” Madi asks excitedly as soon as the glass door swings shut behind Clarke.

Clarke had hired Madi a few months back when she realized she needed an extra set of hands around the store since— well, since she couldn’t run the shop by herself. Their friends always help where they can, like Harper doing the reading circle or Raven fixing whatever mechanical issue arises, but they have their own lives and jobs to worry about too.

But Madi is still just a kid, a few years younger than Clarke was when she inherited the store, and the magic of the Santa Bus is evidenced by the sparkle in her eyes.

“It is…,” Clarke says for lack of anything better to respond with as the boys file in, the bell above the door ringing with each movement of the door. She watches Madi’s eyes widen even more when she sees Bellamy is the last one to enter.

“It appears _somebody_ ,” Clarke says pointedly while looking at Bellamy, “decided to take it out of storage.”

To his credit, he at least looks a little bit chastised, even though it’s clear he’s not sorry he’s here. 

He’s _here._

And Clarke’s having a really hard time wrapping her head around that one, simple fact.

“So we’re doing it then?” Madi jumps with glee, an action Clarke rarely sees from Madi, and Clarke just knows she’s not going to be able to say no. More importantly, she doesn’t want to. She knows that countless more people will have the same reaction if they hear the bus rolling down the street.

Still, everyone else is waiting on her for a response, all of them eyeing her carefully, Bellamy more than anyone else.

She looks at each of them in turn, unable to resist her stare staying on Bellamy for a moment longer than the others. And with a relenting sigh, they all burst out into cheers and smiles that have the reading circle moms shushing them even louder the second time around.

After that, chatter breaks out that Madi leads in which they start listing off everything that needs to be done before tonight’s first run. They need to text Raven, Emori, Monroe, and Wells. They need to transfer The Ark’s main holiday stock of books to the bus. Hot chocolate and cookies need to be made. And this all needs to happen before dark tonight.

It should be spiking Clarke’s stress levels, forcing her to take control of the planning and to delegate jobs like she so often does. But instead, the planning continues without her, her friends’ voices becoming background noise as Clarke wanders away, her feet guiding her to her favorite spot in the store. 

In the very center of the store, _the heart_ , Bellamy would always call it, is a small pedestal with a book encased in glass. 

_Our Story_ , it reads, written in Bellamy’s messy scrawl right across the front cover.

No matter what’s happened, this book always gives her a sense of comfort, a sense of calm.

She remembers the day Bellamy gave this to her— four years after being together, on the first anniversary of them taking over The Ark, Bellamy had gifted her the story of their love, from reluctant acquaintances, to friends, to lovers, to more.

It was Bellamy’s first completed work, worked on for months, if not years, pouring everything that made them _them_ into the book that holds the heart of the store. They had decided to place it in the shop as a symbol of their united front in keeping the store going.

Even when they broke up six months ago, she couldn’t bring herself to move it, not when it held such importance to the store and her life.

And if anyone claims to see the book open in the case from time to time, or to find Clarke in her favorite nook in the store, plopped in a beanbag with the book in hand, well, they can’t prove anything.

“You still have it here,” Bellamy’s voice brings her from her dazed thoughts as he looks down at her softly, his eyes glancing down at the case as he places a gentle hand on the top of the glass as if he can reach straight through glass to brush the pages he painstakingly wrote on.

“Of course I did,” she answers back just as soft, the voices from the front still drifting back to them. “It’s a part of this place,” she says with a wave around her.

“It’s a part of us,” he answers back, knocking her breath out of her with the intensity with which he says it.

She opens her mouth to respond, with what, she has no idea, but the bell on the door jangles, signaling a newcomer that reveals herself to be Raven seconds later as she calls to Clarke from the front of the shop.

Clarke sighs, thanking whoever’s listening that reading circle is over and that Harper has joined the planning chaos, before glancing once more at Bellamy. 

He wants to say more, she can tell, but this isn’t the time. Isn’t the place. So instead, Clarke turns to head back to their friends, Raven’s eyes finding her immediately before trailing behind her to see Bellamy following her. 

Raven’s brow lifts, always able to express her thoughts with just a look. “Santa Bus is a go?”

Everyone’s eyes fall on her again as if worried she’s changed her mind in the five minute period of time.

“It is,” Clarke confirms, glancing around at the group.

“And you’re good with—,” Raven hesitates, glances at Bellamy from where he now stands next to Miller. “Everything?”

“Everything?” Madi asks curiously.

Before Clarke or Raven can even attempt to respond, Jasper’s cutting in. “Oh you haven’t heard?” Jasper asks dramatically, and Clarke resists heaving a groan at where she’s sure this is going. How it always goes when one of their friends starts off with that question.

Madi just looks on confusedly, which Jasper takes as answer enough. “Bellamy and Clarke broke up because they couldn’t decide which cookies to serve on the Santa Bus. That’s why it was cancelled,” he mock-whispers conspiratorially.

Everyone else rolls their eyes as Madi scrunches her nose up in confusion. She’s never seen their friends do this before, so she looks to Clarke for an answer. “That’s not really why you guys broke up, right?” Madi asks both Clarke and Bellamy, who resolutely do not look at one another.

Of course Madi knows the situation, but she’s always been respectful enough to never ask. Their friends, on the other hand...

“Don’t mind him Mads,” Clarke tells her while aiming a glare at Jasper.

“I heard it was because Abby forbade Clarke from seeing him anymore,” Murphy adds on, only stirring the pot more and making Madi even more confused.

“As yes,” Bellamy finally counters, “Abby just decidedly woke up one day seven years in and said ‘you know, I actually hate that Bellamy Blake.’” Thankfully, the roll of the eyes is evident from his tone, no serious hurt in sight.

Poor Madi looks lost, and Clarke is _not_ smiling at Bellamy’s response. She’s _not._

It’s just that, when Bellamy and Clarke broke up six months ago, their friends didn’t know why. Bellamy was planning to go to Polis to finish writing his first original story, to get it published. 

And Clarke was planning to go with him.

Abby was going to manage the store while they moved to the city for the year or so, and then they would decide what to do next. Return home to Arkadia, or move on to their next adventure together.

Whatever they decided, it was supposed to be _together._

But Bellamy left, and Clarke didn’t. And their friends don’t know or understand why. 

So instead, they play this game of random, exaggerated, ridiculous guesses in the hopes that Clarke will tell them the truth. This is the first time they’ve done it with Bellamy here though since, well, it’s the first time he’s been back in those six months.

Madi again looks to Clarke for answers. “They’re just being nosy,” she says with a shrug of her shoulders and a warning look to the rest of them. 

There’s a reason they don’t know the true nature of the breakup.

* * *

Not long after, they split into groups once Emori and Monroe arrive. Clarke closes the shop down for the rest of the day with a sign in the window explaining the start of the Santa Bus that night and finally takes charge of assigning tasks to each group to complete.

Lights on the bus need fixing, books need transferring, and cookies and hot chocolate need making. 

Once everyone knows what they need to do, Monty, Miller, Murphy and Bellamy head out to the bus while everyone else heads to Harper’s house to bake, leaving Madi, Raven, and Clarke in the store to collect the books.

It’s easy enough work, mainly because Clarke always keeps the same organized plan every year. Their holiday collection of classics and new releases is always nestled into the front corner of the shop, which they then always choose the bus selections from. Just because the bus wasn’t supposed to happen, doesn’t mean Clarke changed the routine.

All they need to do is select one of each classic and decide which new books to add to the mix.

Clarke has Madi picking through whatever new books she wants to choose while her and Raven gather all of the traditional stories.

Clarke runs back into the storage to grab holiday crates she desgined herself that will house the books— one dedicated to each of the range of holidays. When she comes pack with two of the crates in hand, she overhears Madi asking Raven about the strange conversation with Jasper and Murphy earlier.

Raven catches Clarke’s eye with a smirk before looking back to Madi with a glint in her eye. “Oh you haven’t heard?” Raven asks teasingly. 

Madi just groans at the rhetorical question, and Clarke huffs out a laugh. Madi’s already tired of a question Clarke’s heard her friends say more times than she can count. 

Still, Raven continues on. “They broke up because Clarke suggested changing the ‘Jingle Bell’ honk on the bus to ‘Frosty the Snowman’. The man nearly cried,” Raven finishes with a wink.

Madi grumbles something intelligible as she hears Clarke come back to the shop front, making Clarke smile. She grabs the Christmas stack Madi hands to her, carefully placing them into the red and green crate before focusing on the Hannakah books next, no more discussion about the break up discussed.

Not long after, the bell above the door rings as Bellamy pops his head in. “We’re ready for books whenever you guys are.”

“I’ll help bring them out,” Clarke says, knowing Madi is enjoying picking out the books and not wanting Raven to irritate her leg with unnecessary heavy lifting. 

Bellamy simply nods his head, walking by to stack two crates on top of each other before walking in front of her to hold the door open for her. She follows him out, smiling her thanks as she hauls her crate outside, her side brushing against him as she squeezes through the gap in the doorway he gave her.

Clarke can’t stop the warmth that rushes through her at the contact, even if she tried.

She dares to glance up at Bellamy, both of them squished in the doorway, and she’d dare to say he’s just as affected by the inadvertent touch as she is with the heat she thinks she sees in his eyes, but then there’s a clearing of a voice in front of them, breaking them from their locked gaze. 

They both whip their heads to find Miller in front of them, smirking at them like he knows something they don’t.

Even more interestingly, is the exchange of money that is occurring between Murphy and Jasper through the windows of the Santa Bus as they stand in the aisle inside the bus.

Clarke makes a flustered sound in her throat as she plops her crate into Miller’s unexpecting arms so that she can march straight onto the bus.

Murphy and Jasper must see her coming, because they’re clearly scrambling to hide whatever they’re doing by the time she’s standing in the aisle in front of them with her hands on her hips and a look on her face that they know means she’s not messing around.

“What are you doing?” She prompts crisply.

“Nothing!” Jasper shouts abruptly, even as he continues to struggle with something as he tries to hide behind Murphy.

Clarke takes two more steps forward before Murphy takes a step closer to her, blocking her path to Jasper with an amused quirk of his brow. Clarke glares back, unamused.

She pauses for a moment, considering her options before faking right, Murphy leaning in that direction, allowing her to quickly switch left and leap over the bus seat ungracefully to spot Jasper juggling a jar of what sounds like money. What looks like _a lot_ of money, from what she can see before Jasper is turning away from her with an unmanly squeal.

“Jasper!” Clarke yells, no shame in crawling over him to see what he has. “Do you have a jar of money!?”

“No!” He yells futilely.

“Where did a _jar of money_ even come from!?” She carries on, arms twisting with Jasper’s as he passes the jar over to Murphy, who turns to escape the bus just as Bellamy climbs the steps, Miller and Monty peaking up from the lower steps. “What the hell is going on here?” Bellamy asks, noting the human pretzel Clarke and Jasper have become and Murphy trying to make a speedy retreat with a jar full of cash.

Finally, everyone stills. Clarke untangles herself from Jasper and eyes the jar in Murphy’s hands, a piece of duct tape plastered to the side of it with the words ‘Did They or Didn’t They?’ written on it with Sharpie.

It takes Clarke all of a second to realize what is happening.

“Are you guys _betting_ on us?” 

“No!” Jasper startles at the question at the same time Murphy simply responds with, “yep.”

Clarke glances over to Bellamy’s shocked expression, right before noting Miller and Monty’s suspiciously not-surprised expressions. “Are you guys _in_ on this?” She asks them, knowing the answer before she even asks the question. One sideways glance towards one another is enough.

“You were betting money on if we’re getting back together?” Bellamy asks almost dumbly, as if he’s saying the words, but can’t wrap his head around it. Then with a glance at the jar, “a lot of money?”

Silence follows, before Murphy breaks it. “Woah there Blake, you’re jumping to quite the assumption there.”

“Really.” Clarke deadpans, because that was her first thought too. “What _are_ you betting on then? Because it clearly has to do with Bellamy and me with how badly you didn’t want me to see it.” And the longer she thinks about that, the warmer her cheeks feel about the prospect laid out in front of them. “So you tell me right now—”

“Your story,” Murphy says abruptly, effectively cutting Clarke’s rant short.

“Excuse me?” She glances briefly to an equally confused Bellamy, while Miller, Monty, and Jasper remain unreadable.

Murphy shrugs his shoulder, jar still in hand, before he continues. “We’re betting on your little story you keep in the shop,” he explains with a tilt of his chin back in the direction of the front of The Ark.

“Our story,” Bellamy repeats, while Clarke begins feel her hackles rise.

“What about our story?” She demands.

At that, Murphy has the audacity to roll his eyes. “We were betting on who would keep the book now that you guys are donezo. Whether you decided.”

Bellamy catches her attention with a strangled sound. “Of course Clarke would keep it, it’s _hers_ ,” Bellamy declares as if it’s the most well-known fact in the world.

For the record, it isn’t. Though having the knowledge that he’d always want her to keep it has that familiar warmth she has only ever affiliated with Bellamy settling in her stomach.

“But it’s _our_ story,” she counters. To who she is countering, she’s not really sure. Bellamy, she supposes, though she feels as if they’re on the same side in this conversation. “And it will remain in the heart of _our_ shop, just like it always has.”

She says it firmly, and solely looking at Bellamy, despite how she wants to glare at each of the others in turn. The four of them, and undoubtedly the rest of their friends, she’s sure, are in on some kind of bet about her and Bellamy. She can’t decide if she’s more aggravated because the whole thing is ridiculous, or impressed with how much money is in that jar, bills and coins alike. 

In the end she decides she can be a bit of both as she barges past them with a roll of the eyes pointed at the four guilty friends. “Well if that _is_ what you were betting on, you’ll be betting for a while longer by the sounds of it, since the book is staying right where it is. Where it _belongs_ ,” she announces to them before making as dignified an exit as she can given the circumstances.

She is careful about brushing past Bellamy in the confined space while Monty and Miller exit the bus to give her room to walk away.

She thinks Bellamy might follow her from the way she can feel his gaze on her back.

* * *

Here’s what Clarke and Bellamy’s friends don’t know about their break up six months ago.

Despite no malicious intent and what Clarke’s sure were actions and words brought out only because they cared, their friends played a part in why they broke up.

The plan had been for Bellamy to get published while in Polis, and Clarke was going to go with him for those few months to help him, especially since she managed so much of the business aspect of The Ark and its affiliated publishers.

They had no doubt the shop would be in good hands, but then one of their friends commented on how they couldn’t believe Clarke was willing to leave her dad’s shop.

It was a totally innocent comment that stuck on replay in Clarke’s head for weeks.

Once that thought was planted, Clarke thought maybe she should stay in Arkadia, manage Bellamy’s meetings in another format while staying with the store, and do long distance with Bellamy for the months he needed to be in Polis.

Except another harmless comment from one of their friends about long distance being difficult, near impossible for them lead to Bellamy thinking Clarke wanted out of the relationship entirely.

She didn’t, for the record. And she doesn’t think he did either.

But their friends are an opinionated bunch, again, with the best of intentions of trying to help. And with each passing comment, tip, advice— Clarke and Bellamy felt the strain on a seven year relationship that once felt solid.

So when mid-argument one day, she flung her hands up and heatedly in the moment threw out that the only option they had left was to break up…

Well, that’s what they did.

It wasn’t their friends’ faults. It was entirely on Clarke and Bellamy.

They didn’t mean to plant the seeds, but boy did Clarke and Bellamy water them.

* * *

At five o’clock that night, just as the sun finally sets and the town's holiday lights begin to blink on in the dark, the final preparations for the Santa Bus are completed.

Crates of books fill the front few bus seats, with the bus smelling of rich hot chocolate being kept warm in heated containers and chocolate chip cookies made from the famous McIntyre/Monroe secret recipe. 

Everybody is gathered on the sidewalk as Emori passes out Santa hats, pecking Murphy on the check as she places his hat on his head before walking over to where Clarke is making sure the shop is locked up for the night before they start the town tour and pick up their first riders.

Mayor Wells certainly got this word out in a short period of time, and he and many townspeople are waiting for them near Town Hall.

“Murphy told us you found the bet jar,” Emori says in what sounds like an apology as Clarke lets Emori fix the hat on Clarke’s head. 

Clarke heaves a sigh before quirking a brow at Emori. She had the whole afternoon to think about it as she finished collecting the books with Madi and Raven. Raven must have gotten wind of the showdown on the bus, but let Clarke think it through without comment or input, for which Clarke was grateful.

In the end, Clarke’s not mad, or annoyed, or aggravated, or impressed.

Their friends would never do anything to hurt them, they were just having a bit of fun, and that she could get behind. 

But does she believe the bet was about her and Bellamy’s story? Debatable.

She has no proof, and Clarke’s not about to pick a fight when they’re here to have a fun time together and spread some holiday cheer.

So instead, Clarke responds with, “next time let me know what your bet is and I’ll help you win.”

She’s teasing, of course, but Emori hugs her with a laugh anyways. “You’ve got it, girl. We’ll get dressed up all nice and fancy and splurge at an expensive restaurant, leave the boys at home.”

The last bit gives Clarke pause, making her look up at Emori in confusion. She wants to ask Emori what she meant, but isn’t given the chance when the ‘Jingle Bell’ horn starts blaring. They both turn to find everyone else already loaded and ready on the bus, Bellamy staring intently at them with his Santa hat crooked on his head.

“All aboard the Santa Bus!” He calls, making them both snort as they head towards the steps and hop on. 

As she walks past Bellamy in the driver’s seat, Clarke dares to give his shoulder a squeeze, noting how he leans into her touch for just a moment before reaching for the handle that closes the bus doors, giving Clarke the chance to settle into her usual front seat, directly diagonal from him.

After all, tradition is tradition.

And with that, the Santa Bus is in its way.

* * *

The night flies by with more readers than they could possibly fit into the bus for one night.

With promises that they would be back around tomorrow, and the day after that, and the day after that, Bellamy finally rolls the Santa Bus to a stop in front of The Ark well past the final run time of past years. 

They all just kept egging each other on for one more lap around town, until Madi started dozing off in the back seat, and Clarke made the executive decision to drop off their remaining readers and head back to the shop.

Everyone is exhausted as they unload from the bus, Clarke dragging her feet to the store’s door to unlock it so that everyone could empty the bus’s contents quickly into the shop in preparation for tomorrow night’s ventures. 

The work is quick, but apparently the night is young as everyone aside from Madi suddenly decides to head down to their favorite bar for celebratory drinks before officially calling it a night.

“You guys go on,” Clarke calls as they gather at the front desk in the shop with their plans finalized. “I’m going to head home for the night. Today’s got me beat,” she tells them even as they complain and groan at her plans.

Still, nobody gives her any trouble, even as she feels Bellamy’s eyes on her for longer than she did this morning. He seems to wait until everyone has herded out onto the sidewalk again, but then with a final wave goodbye from her to head out and a promise that she’d be leaving in a moment, turns out the door too.

And with the shop finally silent, Clarke makes one last stop in her little bookstore before heading home for the night.

* * *

Clarke makes quick work of getting back to her apartment, having to stifle a yawn as she takes her keys out of her bag before she can even attempt to get them in the knob.

When she finally does, she opens her apartment door to be meet with the sweet smell of takeout and Christmas music playing softly in the background. She kicks her boots off, tossing her coat on the nearby hook and her forgotten Santa hat next to its twin on the counter as she walks by.

She follows the sounds of dish’s clanking into the kitchen. 

“Smells good in here,” Clarke comments, walking up behind him as he reaches up for two wine glasses, wrapping her arms around him from behind. “I wish you had told me you were planning on doing the Santa Bus the whole time.”

Bellamy chuckles, her hands feeling the vibrations from where they rest against his chest. “And ruin my grand entrance on the most festive vehicle in Arkadia?” He teases her, twisting in her arms so that he can wrap is arms around her too. “Hi,” he adds on once his arms are wrapped around her and he’s tilting down to brush his nose against hers.

“Hi,” she whispers back with a smile. “Welcome home,” she says, right before reaching up to finally crash their lips together.

He gasps into her mouth at the contact, and she knows he was undoubtedly waiting for this just as much as she was from the moment she laid eyes on him this morning. 

When they pull away, Bellamy’s smile matches her own in goofiness, neither able to look away from the other. “I can’t believe you let me think you couldn’t come for Santa Bus last weekend when I visited,” she chastises without any real heat behind it.

Bellamy just hums in response, much more intent on stealing another kiss than responding with words. He kisses her some more before she finally gathers enough wits to pull away and arch an eyebrow at him.

Finally, he relents. “I wanted to surprise you,” he tells her earnestly. “I know it was risky, but I knew you were upset about not doing the bus, and I knew I could fix that.”

His words warm her in the same way his brief touches during the day today had, only tenfold. 

“Screw risky,” she tells him with another peck to his lips. “Our friends are freaking betting on us, Bell.”

He laughs at that with a rueful shake of his head, though he seems no more mad about it than she is, which isn’t mad at all. “Well they’re certainly not betting on our book, that’s for sure.”

“Oh you mean you haven’t heard?” Clarke says in a sing-song voice that has Bellamy groaning in amusement. His head tilting so that his forehead is resting on her shoulder.

He turns his head to the side to speak his next words into her neck. “You weren’t kidding about them doing that gimmick.”

“No, I most certainly was not,” she agrees. “Though none of them have ever gotten close. They never guess the part where a week after the breakup, I drove an hour to Polis to see you.”

Belllamy lifts his head at her words. “You mean they miss the part where I had all of my bags packed and was heading out the door to head back to Arkadia, to you, only to see you running down the hallway towards me like some kind fantasy.”

Clarke smiles fondly at the memory of six months ago now, though she was feeling anything but happy at the time.

When she arrived at his apartment to find him leaving, they both started laughing a little bit hysterical before she jumped into his arms, refusing to let go even as he carried her back into his apartment.

“They never guess the part where we got back together a week after we broke up, and decided to keep it between ourselves to avoid any outside opinions or suggestions,” Clarke continues the story, _their_ story.

“And they definitely forget the part where you come visit every Sunday while the shop is closed,” Bellamy adds, because that's his favorite part. That they’ve managed long distance, but have still been able to see each other between the daily texts and phone calls.

Clarke beams at him. “Exactly.”

They didn’t necessarily _mean_ to keep it from their friends, but they’ve enjoyed spending the time together without anyone knowing. The secret has been fun, but if today has shown her anything, it’s that she certainly wants to be able to hold his hand whenever she wants, kiss him just because she wants to. And with Bellamy officially signed with a publisher as of this week and his surprise return home a week before they had planned, she’s thinking it's about time they come clean.

“I think it’s time we tell them the truth,” Clarke says as she pulls away far enough so that her head is tilted up to meet his eyes.

Bellamy looks back at her thoughtfully before humming his agreement. “I suppose you’re right,” his lips press against her forehead briefly before he pulls away from her to collect the takeout containers and plates he had been getting together for them in her absence. Clarke follows him to her couch, wine and glasses in hand as they settle onto the couch.

When Bellamy doesn’t continue the conversation after they start dishing out the food, she again looks at him to find that thoughtful expression hasn’t left his face, and it’s solely directed at her. “What?” She says on a laugh, not knowing what’s happening. 

“Let’s find a house together,” he tells her, putting his plate down to reach for her hand, sending the familiar heat up her arm. “Here,” he clarifies, “in Arkadia. If there’s anything this past six months has shown me, it’s that I hate being without you. And I never want to be without you again.”

The sincerity in his eyes has tears pricking at Clarke’s as she sets her own plate down.

“This sounds more like a marriage proposal than a house proposal,” she tries to tease, but the intensity of the moment has her realizing maybe it is.

“Maybe I should wait for that until our friends actually know we’re together again,” he tells her warmly, threading is fingers with hers, looking like he’s waiting for an actual answer from her.

As if she’d ever have any answer other than, “yes.”

It’s the only word needed to bring her favorite smile of Bellamy’s out. “Yes to all of it, yes to whenever you’re ready to ask me, yes to never spending another day apart.”

She punctuates each statement with a sound kiss to his lips, the last of which results in her climbing into his lap to hug him close while they’re lips glide together seamlessly.

They’re both smiling too much to take it further, but Clarke doesn’t mind. It’s perfect for them.

A thought comes to her as she pulls a way, a giggle erupting from her that has Bellamy laughing along at her giddiness. “We’re totally messing up whatever bet they have going,” Clarke reveals on another giggle as Bellamy rolls his eyes playfully.

“Good. Serves them right. I can tell you it’s certainly not about our story though.”

“Speaking of _Our Story_ …,” Clarke starts, leaning back from where she stills sits in her boyfriend’s lap to stretch her arm out and grab something from the coffee table.

She settles back comfortably with Bellamy eyeing her curiously until he sees what she has in her hands. 

“You up for adding one more chapter to our story?” She asks him as he shakes her head ruefully at her. She had grabbed the book before leaving the shop, planning to have him read a chapter or two to her tonight, but she wouldn’t mind adding some new chapters either.

And though Bellamy’s eyes are still sparkling with amusement, that deeper, thoughtful expression hasn’t left his features either.

“I’ve got a better idea,” he tells her softly with a glance over to the side table against the couch. Clarke follows the direction of his gaze to find a book identical to the one in her own hands laying there, with Bellamy’s familiar writing gracing the cover.

_Our Story, Vol. II_

She looks back at him, only to have the breath knocked out of her when she finds a ring being held in between them with his slightly shaking hand. She tears her eyes away from the ring to look at Bellamy, the love in his eyes surely being reflected back at him in hers.

“Let's start a new story,” he all but whispers. “Here. Together.”

And well, like Clarke said, like she’d ever have any answer other than a resounding ‘yes.’

* * *

On the other side of town, in a bar decorated with lights and filled with the laughs of Clarke and Bellamy’s friends, the ‘Did They or Didn’t They?’ jar makes its rounds around the table, becoming fuller with bills with each set of hands on it.

“Alright, alright,” Raven says to them all as she throws a twenty in. “I thought for sure they’d figure it out on Day 1 of the Santa Bus, especially with _these two_ nearly blowing our cover,” she gestures loudly to where Jasper and Murphy are cackling. “But I’m laying my next bet down for our Christmas Eve party, there’s no way they make it till then.”

Emori grabs the jar, tossing another ten in with the bill she already put in earlier. “I’m amending my bet and tacking on the party too, no way in hell they last. Did you see the way Clarke was looking at him today?”

“Says the one who slipped up,” Miller scoffs, tugging the jar away from her when Murphy mockingly boos in Emori’s direction, before breaking out into a fond smile no more than a second later. 

The table goes quiet as Miller whips out a hundred dollar bill and throws it in the jar. Monty looks at his boyfriend warily while Miller grins with mischief. “A hundred on tomorrow,” he says with a confidence that’s almost suspicious.

“What’s so special about tomorrow?” Harper asks from Monroe’s lap, both having decided to bow out of the bet around Thanksgiving a month ago.

“Just call it a hunch,” Miller says cryptically as Raven eyes him suspiciously.

“You’re holding out on us Miller,” she accuses, before tossing in another fifty. “Fifty on tomorrow too, before the start of the Santa Bus,” she responds in challenge.

When nobody else seems to have anything more to add, Monty grabs the jar, sliding it over to Jasper who seals the lid back over it. 

“Alright!” Jasper calls. “Bets are closed for the night. We’ll see how much longer it takes them to figure out that we know! Could be tomorrow… could be the party…”

“Could be five years from now at this rate,” Murphy mutters as Emori elbows him.

“Oh let them be,” Harper says. “They’ll tell us in their own time,” she scolds lightly. 

Murphy shakes his head, but stands all the same. “To Bellamy and Clarke,” he says, beer in hand as the rest of them lift their drinks as well. Everyone quiets as Murphy continues. “To Mom and Dad. Who figured out their shit even with us meddling with the best of intentions.”

“To Bellamy and Clarke!”

“To Mom and Dad!”

The cheers ring out, glasses clink together as each of them toasts to their friends. Their friends, who despite it all, found their way back to each other, even if they’re not ready for the rest of them to know.

“May their second story be even better than the first.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed this little story of yours!!
> 
> Again, HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE! ❤️💚


End file.
